{"id":627,"date":"2009-01-08T12:32:01","date_gmt":"2009-01-08T12:32:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/stevenwaldman\/2009\/01\/will-israel-split-americas-rel.html"},"modified":"2009-01-08T12:32:01","modified_gmt":"2009-01-08T12:32:01","slug":"will-israel-split-americas-rel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/stevenwaldman\/2009\/01\/will-israel-split-americas-rel.html","title":{"rendered":"Will Israel Split America’s Religious Left?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Protestant religious left has always had some anti-Israel tendencies. The governing bodies for Presbyterians, Methodists and United Church of Christ had all moved toward divesting from companies doing business in Israel,<\/a> morally equating the Jewish state with South Africa.
\nListening to a show on XM’s “Talk Left” this morning, heard author Norman Finkelstein talking about Israel as a fundamentally “lunatic” nation. He has a new book called the End of Zionism and formerly wrote about the “Holocaust industry.”
\nIt won’t be at all surprising if Israel’s troubling invasion of Gaza — and the very real moral problems inherent — become an excuse for categorical and over-stated attacks on “lunatic” Israel. Would this guy have been given a prime spot on this show prior to the Gaza invasion?
\nMost likely what will happen next is that an over-reaction from the Protestant left will prompt American Jews into an uncomfortable (but familiar) defensive crouch in which they suppress their anguish and in many cases disgust about Israel and go forth with a fulsome defense of Israel. Which will make the Protestant left ratchet up its rhetoric further, etc.
\nThis cycle, in which discussion on the left is reduced to “Israel Bad” and “Israel Good” camps, will make matters worse in the middle east because it will mean that American Jews will be reluctant to exert pressure on Israel to change course<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Protestant religious left has always had some anti-Israel tendencies. The governing bodies for Presbyterians, Methodists and United Church of Christ had all moved toward divesting from companies doing business in Israel, morally equating the Jewish state with South Africa. 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